Marble Hill tenants want in on NYCHA boiler fix

‎They’re steamed.

Residents of Marble Hill Houses are not happy that their housing complex was left out of the city’s $200 million plan to replace boilers and upgrade heating systems in New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) developments.

On January 31, the city named 20 NYCHA sites that would receive upgrades, a list that NYCHA said included the housing complexes with the most chronic heat and hot water outages.

Despite not being included in the list, Marble Hill Houses’ tenants say they have endured many days this winter without heat, hot water or cooking gas, despite temperatures in the single digits. The outages have left them unable to cook, and caused them to incur expenses for electric heaters and resort to unsafe methods for heating their apartments.

More than 3,330 tenants live at Marble Hill Houses. Photo: Ben Brody.

Councilmember Ydanis Rodriguez visited the complex on February 6 to speak with Tony Edwards, President of the NYCHA Marble Hill Tenants Association and residents about the heating issues.

One resident complained to Rodriguez that the temperature in his building was unpredictable.

“They have too much heat on one side of the building, then you go on the opposite side of the building, you’ll find there’s not enough heat,” the tenant said.

In a letter sent to NYCHA on February 2, Rodriguez asked the agency to consider placing Marble Hill Houses, home to over 3,300 residents, on the list of developments scheduled for upgrades and repairs.

Residents say they often lack heat or hot water. Photo: Cris Vivar

“While I understand that this is a matter that is affecting numerous developments citywide, the lack of gas and heat is a recurring issue at this development every year,” Rodriguez wrote. “NYCHA receives several requests every winter from various elected officials asking that these problems be addressed. We have also requested numerous times a town hall for NYCHA to address these issues directly and has yet to be organized.”

Rodriguez’s visit occurred on the same day NYCHA executives were grilled by City Councilmembers at an oversight hearing to examine the failure of NYCHA’s heating systems and boilers that have left thousands of public housing residents without heat and hot water during the coldest days of the winter.

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